


Revenant

by lsularak



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: A lot of religion, Emotions, Post-Defenders, Post-Episode: s01e08 The Defenders, Post-Season 2, Religion, a shitton of religion, and stuff, by like everyone, hmmmmmm, i guess, i need to learn how to tag, its short and i apologize, kinda emotional hurt??, matt is presumed dead, tagging is hard, the Devil - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-15 17:36:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19300519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lsularak/pseuds/lsularak
Summary: His stomach was roiling. Empty, except for the acids in it. Sick, but with nothing to come out. It was an awful feeling, really, but it was no less than he deserved. No less than he deserved for dying. No less than he deserved for coming back. A revenant in a world that never wanted him. A vengeful spirit to haunt the streets that had forgotten him; but he didn’t forget them. He could never forget them.Matthew is dead, or at least that's what he wants to believe.





	Revenant

**Author's Note:**

> i have written,,, another Thing,,, the problem here is i wrote this while lightly sleep deprived in summer school, so like, yeah, sorry in advance if its wonky jghls
> 
> constructive criticism is welcome as usual!!

His stomach was roiling. Empty, except for the acids in it. Sick, but with nothing to come out. It was an awful feeling, really, but it was no less than he deserved. No less than he deserved for dying. No less than he deserved for coming back. A revenant in a world that never wanted him. A vengeful spirit to haunt the streets that had forgotten him; but he didn’t forget them. He could never forget them. 

Spirits don’t need to eat.

He was fine.

He did the only thing he could do; push on and through it. A turbulent stomach was no match for the Devil, almost nothing was. A building collapsing down on his head while he held onto the shell of a woman he had loved, still loved, would never _stop_ loving, wasn’t enough. Not even his own mind trying to eat itself alive, tear itself apart from the inside out, was enough. The Devil was nothing if not persistent, his defining quality among the world, criminal and civil.

He powered through. He continued his patrol, senses thrown out haphazardly to find something, anything to fight. His fists were itching, his body was a thrumming mass of energy and nerves, just begging for something to hurt, to punch, and the city was not providing. The city that had so often, until now, given the Devil every fight he had ever wanted, and even some he never wanted, could’ve gone his entire life without. He was given them, though, but that was when he couldn’t take them all on, couldn’t risk the injuries that he wouldn’t be able to hide. Now, though, the Devil has no one to see the pains and aches that cover his body, and yet now he cannot find any of the fights the city so graciously gave out before.

He never should have asked the others to look out for his city. Just because he feared what would happen to it when he died. He should have known better than to assume he would stop defending the city when his heart stopped beating. Should have known that his immortal soul would keep vigil over the city that made him, crafted him into the Devil he was, that kept fueling the fire that had burned Matthew alive and left nothing but the Devil in its wake.

Only the Devil was left, or at least that’s what he tried to convince himself of. There was no more Matthew in his body, no more Murdocks. No more fancy law degree and no more homes where he could lay his weary body to rest. There was nothing left living of a Matthew Murdock left in the world, except a body that so happened to have his face.

Despite this belief, this undeniable feeling of it being true, the body formerly known as Matt had unconsciously made his way to his old friend’s home. Well, at least what used to be his home. Fitting, that since there was nothing left of Matt, there would be nothing left of Foggy. One half of the pair dies, and the other does the same. Death tends to do that, but it still hurt the bit of the Devil that wasn’t meant to exist, still tugged at a distant emotion that was buried with Matt at Midland Circle. He didn’t waste the time to try to discern what it might be.

The Devil, feeling something suspiciously like sorrow rattling around in his chest, left the former home of someone who he knew once upon a time. 

That was long ago, though, too long ago to think about, not worth the time or energy, not since all it would accomplish would be digging up a grave, the dead should be left to lie, after all. Matt didn’t need to come back since Foggy was already gone. Karen, too. The Devil had checked on her not long ago, and discovered that she had left the old Karen behind. No, not the important parts of Karen, the parts that made her fierce and wouldn’t allow a mystery to go unsolved, the part that hunted for the truth, not those, they were too valuable, but the parts that had ties to Nelson and Murdock, Matt and Foggy. Virtue lasagna and hiding wires in ceiling tiles, drinking the eel with a giggle before drunkenly going off to buy a bluefin, walking in the rain with a content smile on her face.

Those parts. Those parts died with Foggy. They may have had a fighting chance with just Matt gone, maybe even a sliver of them could’ve stayed, but Foggy died, too, and that killed their only chance at survival. The death of a universe, one thousand inside jokes killed in the blink of an eye, friendships ending in the same blink, all because one link in the three-person chain had snapped, leaving the two other links alone, ready to be moved onto new chains. 

So, yes, the Devil was going to let the dead lie, resurrecting Matthew ran the risk of bringing back Foggy and Karen, and none of the dead wanted to come back. It was better to let them rot in their graves, the sickening smell of decay buried beneath tons of concrete and steel with no way to resurface; leaving just the Devil, Franklin, and Ms. Page among the world, doing their damages and carrying on.

Of course, sometimes the longing to have them all back together came back to the Devil from Midland Circle, came back and begged him to reconsider, to think about the good it would do for the world to have Matthew in it again, too, but he pushed the longing down into the cage by his heart that the Devil used to reside in, locked it, and threw the key into the rubble where Matthew was buried.

No, the world did not need Matthew. A world with Matthew was a world that ran the risk of Foggy and Karen being arrested, tortured, killed for knowing who he was, a world where their safety was nonexistent, a world where people like the Punisher with a less strict code could find them, find out everything, destroy them singlehandedly without breaking a sweat.

A world with Matthew was not one that was going to exist.

The Devil kept to himself, appearing at odd hours to a church to rest for just a few hours, to sew up his wounds and keep going so long as he had enough blood in his body to be functional. Strange, that the Devil should be going to church. Devils aren’t meant for holy grounds, but this one chooses such grounds to lick his wounds, to rest in safety. Matthew is not as dead as the Devil wishes him to be; that is the explanation for this.

So, if the next time he’s out, if the Devil goes by the dead’s old homes and apologizes, and if he hovers too near to their new homes, perhaps there is a reason that he feels sorrow stabbing at his heart. Perhaps Matthew could have a second chance while not dragging the others out of their graves. Perhaps the dead could lie, and Matthew could live again.


End file.
